The Waters & the Wild by Francesca Lia Block Page A

herself, but her life had changed overnight.
    â€œI’m Bee.”
    He nodded. He had high, fine cheekbonesand lips like a starlet’s. A little acne on his high forehead where a black lock of hair fell forward over his eyes.
    Haze. Who was this boy? Everyone made fun of him. He stammered. He was smart. Unironically ugly, thick-lensed, thick-framed glasses. Problem skin. Beautiful eyes. Hands with tapered fingers and prominent veins, although his nails were bitten so much it looked painful. He had nice lips. Did anyone notice those lips? Did he really believe he was an alien? He read big thick books about stuff most people didn’t believe existed.
    â€œYou’re Haze, right?”
    He nodded again, looked down at his book.
    â€œWhat are you reading?”
    He closed and turned it so she could see the cover.
    The Encyclopedia of the Paranormal . She knew he was the right one to talk to.
    â€œI have a question for you and your book.”
    This sparked his interest, she could tell. His eyes got darker behind the lenses of his glasses and he tilted his head almost imperceptibly to the side, watching her. She realized he hadn’t said a word this whole time, but it felt like he had, somehow.
    â€œIs there some phenomenon about someone who looks just like you, like a twin? What’s that called? This twin who shows up and then just disappears?”
    He was finding something in his book, flipping through it—he knew what he wanted. Yes, there it was. He pushed it across the table to her.
    â€œDoppelganger,” it said.
    She read the definition. A chill grazed her spine, as if he’d slipped an ice cube down her shirt. But Haze would never have done that. He wasn’t a tease. He wasn’t a flirt. And the chill was worse, too, than ice. So cold it went through her skin and penetrated to the marrow of her bones.
    She read further. “The sighting of one’s doppelganger is often associated with a premonition of the viewer’s imminent death.”
    â€œâ€˜Ere Babylon was dust,
    The Magus Zoroaster, my dead child,
    Met his own image walking in the garden.
    That apparition, sole of men, he saw.
    For know there are two worlds of life and death:
    One that which thou beholdest; but the other
    Is underneath the grave, where do inhabit
    The shadows of all forms that think and live
    Till death unite them and they part no more…’”
    â€œWhat?” The words were like a cold, bittersweet elixir that made her spine tingle. “Who wrote that?” she asked, but it was suddenly hard to talk.
    â€œSh-helley,” Haze stammered. His voice, quoting the poem, had been like ironed silk or still water. “We all die, though, you know? It isn’t that bad really.”
    She got up from the table. The cafeteria floor was so sticky that her sneakers made a soft popping when she moved; it sounded as if someone was following her. All around her was noise and the sickening smells of grease. Her stomach tumbled, nauseous, and the faces of the other kids eating their lunches glowed with a bilious yellow-greenish light,the color of fear. Why had she talked to him at all?
    â€œWait.”
    But she was hurrying away from him. In the glass cafeteria wall a girl was running beside her.

2
Identity Thing
    L ew was in the garden, under the plum tree, when she got home from school. Doing someone’s chart. As practical as her mom was, Lew was the opposite. Just dreaming all the time. Making a living from astrology and tarot readings, publishing the occasional esoteric article. He pushed his wheelchair back from the tablewhen she got there. There were purple plum stains on the brick patio.
    â€œAre you okay?” she asked him.
    â€œI was just going to ask you that.”
    â€œYou look pale.”
    â€œSo do you. Did you eat?”
    â€œI don’t have much appetite. It was a rough night.”
    â€œBad dreams?”
    Lew was watching her carefully now. He did